Meet the Designers: Charlotte Taylor and Oscar Piccolo of dellostudio

For the past few weeks, our team has been busily preparing a unique pop-up installation in honour of the 10th annual Paris Déco Off. But they haven’t gone it alone. To do our nine distinctive new paint colours justice, we enlisted the design talents of multidisciplinary design studio dellostudio.

Consisting of Charlotte Taylor and Oscar Piccolo, the studio operates across two countries and innumerable disciplines. The result? Dreamily abstract illustrations, architectural creations and more, now including a world of shapes and spaces created especially for us in Paris’ Galerie Lélia Mordoch. We caught up with them to discuss the project.

Charlotte Taylor and Oscar Piccolo | Photograph by Paloma Wool

01: What was your experience of working with our nine new colours? Do they differ from the palettes you’re normally drawn to?

dello is usually defined by a very strict palette, so working outside of this with the nine new colours encouraged us to be more playful and to explore our work in a different light.

02: Changing light has a huge impact on how our colours are perceived, so we’re always keeping it in mind. What role does light tend to play in your projects?

Light is a fundamental element to our studio – its presence and shadow contribute another layer to the composition of space and the overall essence of the piece. We have a preference for natural light as its softness complements the organic forms of our sculptures.

An interpretation of the nine new colours by dellostudio

03: How do your passions for objects and architectural features translate into your own interiors?

We live with our sculptures! We tend to think of our homes as a continuation of our studio.

04: The joy of dellostudio is its openness to multiple disciplines. What do you have in mind next? Is there anything you’d rule out exploring in the future?

We don’t define dello by any particular discipline. We founded it on the crossover between creative fields, and for us, this is essential to creating exciting and progressive work. We’re currently extending our spatial exploration to its inhabiting objects, designing our first furniture series. Due to the nature of our practice and its emphasis on collaboration, we don’t rule out anything, as our studio is a sum of many creative practices.

05: What sparked your decision to become a collaborative? Was it instantaneous or more gradual?

dello came about as a necessity to join forces and make ambitious work. Following our first year together at Goldsmiths University we recognised a shared interest in subject matter, working with scale and going against traditional design norms. As a rather impulsive decision, we left Goldsmiths and applied as a collective to Chelsea College of Arts, where we had the freedom to cultivate our projects.

Carlota Guerrero installation by dellostudio

06: What do your different skill sets and perspectives bring to your joint projects?

Due to the ethos of the studio, we don’t have separate or specific roles. We work simultaneously on different aspects and stages of a project, and our different skill sets are merged within this process. We often share a common vision based on different perspectives, and our process develops as an organic back-and-forth conversation and exchange of ideas. As we’re now based between two cities, our studio dynamic is adapting accordingly.

07: How does the experience of creating digital pieces compare with making physical installations? Do you prefer one over the other?

During the course of a project, the studio flows between digital and analogue mediums. It’s all part of the same process for us. We tend to play through a series of sketches, models and objects in the initial stage of making, and then develop these into digital renders that are essential to the final physical form. Both approaches are co-dependent.

After a stint at the University of Oxford writing about books, Carys was overjoyed to happen upon a career writing about her other favourite thing: colour. A copywriter by day and singer-songwriter by night, Carys can usually be found scouring Pinterest for new interior ideas or noodling on one of her many musical instruments.